/ The Battalion
f I Serving the University community
I L 76 No. 3 USPS 045360 24 Pages In 2 Sections College Station, Texas Friday, September 3, 1982
=d
roSom
states promise
loliday control
,| United Press International
J Police in several states vowed
c crack down on drunken drivers as
Labor Day weekend arrived to
the official end of summer —
^mplete with parades, fireworks,
! :nics and end-of-the season camp-
trips.
The National Safety Council pre
yed as many as 560 people may die
tralfic accidents over the three-day
iliday weekend which becins at 6
1 u -m,;local time today and ends at mid-
ic f ght Monday. Last year, 473 people
4 killed and 21,000 seriously in-
" ■ in traffic accidents.
, City, state, county and federal.
4 fices were expected to be closed
JjB>gh° u t th e nation Monday,
I wig thousands of people to enjoy
^K>ite from their daily labors.
■ In Massachusetts a combination of
I tte. local and Metropolitan District
^ammission police planned to blank-
dine on
et the highways, armed with new
mandatory minimum drunken driv
ing penalties of one to two weeks in
jail and stiff fines for repeat offen
ders.
“Law enforcement officials will be
looking for and zeroing in on the
drunken driver,” Public Safety Sec
retary George Luciano said. “The re
volving door of justice for the drink
ing driver will be closed that much
quicker.”
Michigan police planned to put an
extra 400 state troopers on the high
ways during the weekend to enforce
speed limits and drunken driving
laws, officials said. Continued crack
downs were also planned in San Fran
cisco and Arizona.
Indianapolis and Chicago both
planned to stage their first Labor Day
parades in decades, complete with
floats and marching bands.
The Indianapolis parade will be
the first in that city since 1942.
The Labor Day parade was sus
pended because of World War II and
never resumed. Organizers say the
parade hereafter will be an annual
event.
“I guess we have simply gotten fat,
lazy and complacent,” one organizer
said.
Chicago’s first Labor Day parade
since 1952 was expected to attract
thousands of people who also can par
take of an evening concert and and
extravagant fireworks display boast
ing the theme “American Workers:
The Winning Team.”
In Phoenix, state department of
public safety officials Thursday de
fended their legal right to set up con
troversial roadblocks during the
weekend and said they would be of
“minimum inconvenience” to motor
ists.
urges hard
DWI cases
United Press International
AUSTIN — A state insurance
fficial has urged jurors to show no
lertv for drunken drivers he char-
:t|rizes as the one of the most “se-
ious threats to human life since the
iotnam war.”
«NT
EASY
sLaw enforcement officers across
'exas are assigning a high priority to
“Te DWI problem, but their efforts
_'il| be lost if jurors and judges view
ae drinking driver with a lack of re-
__;ard and simply dismiss or reduce the
barges,” Jerry Johns said Thursday.
| Johns, president of Southwestern
insurance Information Service, said
urors must bear the burden of get-
-ing drunken drivers off Texas high-
Yays until the Legislature deals with
the problem in January.
legislation supported by law en
forcement officials, safety organiza
tions and the insurance industry
would raise the legal drinking age in
Texas from 19 to 21, abolish the open
container law and crack down on re
peat DWI offenders.
Pending any new legislation, a
tougher judicial stance is needed,
Johns said.
“Jurors who hear drunk driving
cases are simply going to have to real
ize that the chronic drinking driver
poses one of the most serious threats
to human life since the Vietnam war,”
he said.
Drunken drivers caused 114 of 206
traffic fatalities in a major Texas city
last year and in another large Texas
city, there was only a 2 percent convic
tion rate in drunken driving cases
through 1981 and a 5 percent rate
through 1982, Johns said.
Jurors err when they sympathize
with drunken driving defendants be
cause they don’t want to see a person
“lose his job, his drivers license and be
branded for life,” he said.
“The experienced drinker who by
choice disregards the law and exposes
innocent motorists to injury and even
death should be punished and rehabi
litated rather than turned loose to
commit the crime again,” he said.
“Last year there were 43,000 DWI
arrests in Texas and only 17 percent
were convicted and received jail
time.”
staff photo by Octavio Garcia
Don't try this at home
Robert Lambert, an environmental design to all students in good physical condition
major, demonstrates his technique at the who wish to learn the art of self-defense.
TAMU Karate Club demonstration this week in Lambert is a senior from Bryan-
G. Rollie White Coliseum. The club is open
Local rents fall as apartments remain vacant
by Hope E. Paasch
Battalion Staff
After enjpying years of 100 percent occu-
)ancy rates, apartment owners are faced with
f * in apartment surplus and are turning to low-
:r rates and more lenient policies to attract
^ enants.
V&A yThe occupancy rate for apartments has
alien 8.5 percent since last fall, and more
rtments are being built.
On Aug. 23, the Texas A&M Off-Campus
ousing Center showed 889 apartment units
—or about 9 percent — of an available 11,000
ere vacant. At the same time last year, only
49:apartments — or 0.5 percent — were avail-
:=3*fable.
In an attempt to fill vacancies, 14 apart
ment complexes have lowered their fall rates,
eral complexes are offering a half month
of free rent, and two complexes are offering a
half month of free rent and $150 to anyone
who will sign a lease. At least one complex is
offering $100 off the first month’s rent.
“We expected prices to fall, but we weren’t
really expecting them to drop until the spring
semester,” said Luann Schulze, off-campus
housing coordinator. “There’s been an in
crease of 15 percent in rent every fall for the
last three years. This is the first time there’s
actually been a decrease.”
Security deposits, which are often $100 to
$200 per person, have been dropped by some
complexes.
More lenient policies toward pets and lease
length have been adopted by some com
plexes. Restrictions on the size of pets, and in
some cases the total banning of pets, no longer
are enforced. Apartments that formerly
accepted only 12-month tenants now are
accepting anyone who will stay for at least
three months.
Complex owners and management com-
C anies are not the only victims of the over-
uild in apartments, Schulze said. An un
usually large number of students can’t find
roommates to help pay rent.
“I’m worried about the number of students
who can’t find roommates,” she said. “What
has happened is that students decided it was
easier to sign a lease than try to find someone
to move in with. In the past, after about mid-
July, very few apartments were left and we
told students it would be best to look through
the card files we have and match themselves
with someone who had a place.
“This year, after the middle of July, there
were still lots of apartments available. Rather
than go through the ‘hassle’ of finding some
one to move in with, students went out and
signed a lease and then put a card on file to
find more roommates. As a result, many stu
dents are going to be stuck.”
Another problem resulting from the sur
plus concerns students who pre-leased apart
ments last spring, Schulze said.
“We’ve already had several students come
in and complain about someone moving in
right next door and paying less rent,” she said.
“Students who pre-leased are not getting a
break in their rent, while someone who just
walked in and signed a lease is getting the very
same type of apartment for less.”
How much less? One complex dropped its
monthly rent from $460 to $299. Some com
plexes have lowered their rates more than
once.
One reason for the high vacancy rate is the
difference between the increase in construc
tion and the increase in enrollment of the
University.
The number of apartments has increased
by 15 percent in the last year.
But the number of students at the Universi
ty increased by only 0.5 percent during the
same period.
Twenty-four new apartment complexes,
containing a total of 1,600 units, have been
built since last fall. Of the 13 complexes com
pleted since January, only two are full. Of the
complexes that are at least one year old, 44
percent are full. Twenty-seven percent of the
complexes built since last fall are full.
Most of the new complexes contain less
than 100 units and are having a difficult time
filling vacanies.
andiver asks increase
ifor teaching, library
1 ~ T-Tamilttf-hn “ T ci i f h cit fTiic will mmf* .
by Beverly Hamilton
Battalion Staff
|| Texas A&M University re
quested a 1984-85 biennium
appropriation of $460,731,693 mil
lion Thursday — the largest single
request made during the three-day
System budget hearings, which
conclude today.
| The University requested $231.3
million for 1984 and $229.4 million
Jfor 1985 from members of the
^Legislative Budget Board staff and
^representatives of the governor’s
-office.
The requested 1984 appropria
tion is an increase of about 59 per
cent over the $136 million approp
riated for the 1983 fiscal year,
which began Wednesday.
After the hearings, the Legisla
tive Budget Board staff and the
governor’s staff will draft an
appropriations bill, which will be
submitted to the next regular ses-
t sion of the Legislature.
"'r® University President Frank E.
Vandiver presented budget re
quests Thursday for faculty salar
ies, departmental operating ex
penses, instructional administra-
tion, library funding and research.
I “Fifty-two percent of the state
^ budget this past year went into
higher education,” Vandiver said.
T suspect that this ratio will come
down and I would urge that if it
does, faculty salaries still remain
among the highest priorities that
we have in all state universities.”
He recommended the Legisla
ture consider an across-the-board
raise for staff members at the Uni
versity.
Vandiver also requested full
funding for departmental operat
ing expenses.
“We are in a real bind on DOE
money,” he said. “The appropria
tion level is quite honestly alarming
for our operating conditions.”
Vandiver also requested in
creased funding for instructional
administration. Low funding in
such areas as co-operative educa
tion would restrict instructional
administration activity and would
reduce effective recruiting efforts
in the University, he said.
Budget funds for the University
library are essential, Vandiver said.
“We’re trying to build the lib
rary; our library is adequate but it is
not distinguished,” he said. “The
increased funding for state univer
sity libraries in the last several years
is a trend, which I hope will con
tinue. It (higher funding) is an
essential item, an item which will
require more than I’m sure the
state can give us.
Vandiver emphasized the im
portance of research and urged
that such indirect costs of research
as laboratory equipment be re
turned to the University instead of
deducted from the next appropria
tion.
“It has damaged our research
situation on the main campus and I
fear it will damage it more,” he said.
A lack of necessary research
funds will force researchers to
move to other universities and will
“do serious damage to the instruc
tional posture of A&M,” he said.
He also asked legislative mem
bers for consideration of computer
equipment and said all Texas A&M
graduates should have program
ming experience. However, Van
diver said, that is not possible be
cause of a lack of computer equip
ment and personnel.
Budget requests scheduled to be
presented today are the Texas
Agricultural Extension Service at 9
a.m., the Texas Engineering Ex
periment Station at 10:30 a.m., the
Texas Transportation Institute at
1:30 p.m., the Texas Engineering
Extension Service at 2:30 p.m., and
the Texas Veterinary Medical
Diagnostic Laboratory at 3:30 p.m.
Insanity defense
misjudged, says
Manson case DA
United Press International
NEW YORK — Vincent Bugliosi,
the district attorney who put mass
murderer Charles Manson behind
bars, thinks many prosecutors and
judges are just plain wrong about
the insanity plea.
“The principal error that pro
secutors make in insanity cases is
that they don’t ask the psychiatrists
‘did he know that in the eyes of soci
ety what he did was wrong?”’ Bug
liosi said. He said it is not sufficient
merely to ascertain whether the de
fendant understood the difference
between right and wrong.
Even judges do not understand
the “subtle critical distinction” of the
insanity plea, said Bugliosi, who is
now in private practice.
The insanity plea, Bugliosi said,
is a legal defense that is rarely suc
cessful, although admittedly suc
cessful enough to become controv
ersial when John Hinckley Jr. was
acquitted of shooting President
Reagan on grounds of insanity.
Without directly commenting on
the Hinckley case, which which he
said he was not fully familiar, Bug
liosi said the frequently unasked
question is not whether the defen
dant knew what he did was wrong,
but whether the defendant knew it
was wrong “in the eyes of society.”
“That’s the issue, because if it’s
not the issue, then every person de
cides for themselves what’s right or
wrong, and becomes a law unto
themselves, and there are persons
who believe it’s okay to dp these
things,” he said.
Bugliosi noted that the 1843
McNaughton opinion, the basis for
the insanity plea, clearly contains
the requirement that a defendant
realize that his actions were wrong
in the eyes of society.
“Most judges aren’t aware of
this,” he said, “and their instructions
are improper.”
On the related subject of
psychiatrists, Bugliosi said, “Fm not
sure they have a place in the cour
troom.
“Their training and their orien
tation is to treat people, it’s not to
punish them.”
Drop-add
ends today
Today is the last day for delayed
registration and drop-add.
In order to drop courses and
add new ones, students must first
see their major department advis
er and obtain a drop-add schedule
revision form signed by the
adviser.
These schedule revisions are to
be turned in at drop-add head
quarters in G. Rollie White Col
iseum. Students must have their
paid fee receipts and class sche
dules (the yellow copy) with them
in order to drop-add.
inside
Classified . j 8
National 8
Opinions 2
Sports 17
State 4
Whatsup 13
forecast
Today’s Forecast: Same as usual.
Very slight chance of afternoon
showers. High in the high 90s, low
in the mid-70s.